Katrine Lea Buendia

BSN 3-

Babies Placed In Incubators Decrease Risk Of

Depression As Adults
ScienceDaily (Nov. 11, 2008) — Babies who receive incubator care
after birth are two to three times less likely to suffer depression as
adults according to a new study published in the journal Psychiatry
Research.
The surprising discovery was made by scientists from the Université de Montréal
and Sainte Justine Hospital Research Center in collaboration with researchers
from McGill University, the Douglas Hospital Research Centre and the Institute of
Psychiatry at King's College in the U.K.
"In mammals, separation between mother and child after birth has always been
considered a major stressor that can cause behavioural problems well into
adulthood," says coauthor Richard E. Tremblay a professor of psychology,
pediatrics and psychiatry at the Université de Montréal and director of the
Research Unit on Children's Psycho-Social Maladjustment at the Sainte Justine
Hospital Research Center. "Our hypothesis was that mother-baby separation
resulting from incubator care could heighten depression in adolescence or
adulthood. Instead, we found that incubator care could decrease the risk of
depression two-to-threefold by the age of 21."
For this study – the first to examine the impact of incubator care on adult
depression – the research team studied a subsample of 1212 children recruited
from a longitudinal study launched in 1986. Children were recruited from Quebec
kindergartens and facts on birth condition, obstetrical complications and
incubator care were obtained through hospital medical records. Participants
received psychiatric assessments when they were 15 and 21 years old.
Researchers found that:

• Of the 16.5 percent babies placed in incubators only 5 percent suffered

major depression by age 21.
• Among participants who were not placed in incubators, 9 percent
developed depression, which is the average rate for general society.
• Correlation between decreased depression and incubator care remained
after factoring participant age, weight at birth, family adversity or maternal
depression.

The research team also found that girls were three times less likely to experience
depression by the age of 15 if they had received incubator care at birth. "This
difference was due to the fact that more girls experience depression than boys
during adolescence and how boys suffer depression in later adolescent years,"
says co author Frank Vitaro, a Université de Montréal professor and member of
the Research Unit on Children's Psychosocial Maladjustment.
Chain of biological and emotional factors
The research team found that direct and indirect stimuli – not just incubators per
se – could decrease depression. For instance, incubators are controlled
environments where body temperature, brain oxygenation, sound and light are
adjusted to maximize neuronal development. What's more, children who received
incubator care as babies typically received more emotional support from their
mothers throughout childhood because they were perceived as more vulnerable.
"Incubator care was not the sole factor that shielded participants from future
depression," says first author David Gourion, formerly of the Université de
Montréal and Sainte Justine Hospital Research Center and now at psychiatrist at
the Hôpital Sainte-Anne in Paris.
"We believe that incubator care is a trigger for a complex chain of biological and
emotional factors that helped decrease depression."